Bio:I'm Burnt Ash, here and elsewhere in the internet world ranging from places like Sonic the Hedgehog forums to tumblr and other Harry Potter related sites. Some of you might want to know where my name comes from: well I once decided to join a Sonic the Hedgehog forum, but I had to think beyond the generic, tired usernames like sonicissocool1110000333. So, I wanted something contradictory. Eventually, this came up to my mind, and my rationale behind it was that "well, ash is already burnt, so the name itself is kind of redundant." The name stuck pretty quickly after that.

I'm a 16 year old kid from the US, currently in my 11th year of school, which contains all sorts of horrors such as the ACT, the SAT, a truckload of AP Courses, and a bunch of college stress to look forward to. Things like Harry Potter and videogames and other books, thankfully, keep me relatively calm.

This is an H/G site, so I figure I should probably elaborate on my position on shipping. I ship all canon, and H/G is probably my Harry Potter OTP. Can't stand non-canon, and Draco ships (most of them anyway) make me cringe, turn green, wince, and then pretend to vomit into my cereal (HBP reference...get it? Ha..ha...haaaaa...I'll stop). That said, I also like canon ships written /realistically/. So, (and there are a number of these), fics with Ron and Hermione getting married two months after the end of DH is a big no-no, character bashing (i.e you hate x character; said character is consequently treated like dragon dung for the rest of the story) is also a really BIG no-no (I don't really care if it's Cho, Umbridge, Ron, Ginny, Hermione, Draco or whoever; character bashing is petty and inherently makes for abysmal character interpretation), and OOC is definitely a no-no (unless it's deliberate and serves a larger purpose). Regardless of my own OTPs though, the more and more fanfiction I read, the more I realize that I'm a very picky H/G fan, to the point where sort of have ideas of things Harry and Ginny /wouldn't/ say, things Harry and Ginny /wouldn't/ do, ways that Harry and Ginny /wouldn't/ act, things that Harry and Ginny /would/ argue about, things that Harry and Ginny /would/ get angry about, among other things. As a result, I get rather critical when reading fanfiction, but I love reading them all the same.

I have lots of Harry Potter ideas, but I very rarely get to discuss them as in-depth as I'd want, because most of my IRL friends aren't that big of Harry Potter enthusiasts. This makes me kind of sad at times, but it also means that I have various conversations inside my own head about ideas, and I can get kind of enthusiastic about them. So here are some of them:

1. On the HBP Breakup

For a long time, I've held the idea that JKR engineered this breakup to be as mutual as it could be, and one of the cool things, I thought, when reading it was that "whoa, Harry and Ginny are being totally, 100% honest and understanding with each other, which is kind of amazing, considering the situation at hand"). It's partly because of this, that I also think that JKR engineered the breakup so that there'd be no anger between the two upon their reunion sometime after DH. They get each other, they get the motive behind the whole breakup, and they move past it eventually. As a result, the Ginny in my mind doesn't blame Harry for most things related to the breakup and the Horcrux Hunt. Now, obviously the year at Hogwarts would have been immensely stressful/terrible (to what extent, YMMV). So yeah, I can picture her being slightly resentful towards Harry and a whole bunch of other people throughout, but I doubt that a lot of that would be genuine. If she got angry over Harry during the year, felt resentful over him, I'm fairly certain that she wouldn't have meant to, and would have gotten over it /before/ the Battle of Hogwarts. There would have been a lot of time for comfort and venting feelings, and, if my interpretation of Hogwarts 1997-1998 is right, Ginny, Neville, and Luna would have been there for each other as much as possible. There /are/ things that I think that they'd argue about in the immediate aftermath of the war, but the HBP breakup/Harry leaving for the Horcrux Hunt are not among those things.

2. On Harry Dying

There is one fanfic that I've read a while ago that sort of embodies my thoughts on the "Harry goes out to die and Ginny's later response" idea. Out of all the characters, I think Ginny would be among the first (probably alongside Ron and Hermione) to let him go. I've always felt like that's one of the reasons that Harry loves Ginny and vice versa, even through the irony/tragedy through death. Would she heartbroken? Yeah, definitely. Angry? Probably. Would she give Harry a chance to explain? Yeah, unless he deliberately avoids talking about it with her.

3. On Arguments (post war)

There is one big thing that I have in mind that would definitely be a source of tension between both Harry and Ginny and that's whole idea of fighting. I imagine that Ginny's slightly peeved at Harry singling her out of the fighting at the beginning of the Battle of Hogwarts, and Harry's probably not all that apologetic about it, because the one thing he wanted to do, not only in regards to Ginny but his friends and the wizarding community in general, was to keep them all safe. If he had the ability to guarantee safety, he'd do it in a heartbeat. This idea of fighting and non-intervention in decision making probably touches upon insecurities/delicate issues on both sides; Ginny is a person who would definitely want to maintain her independent nature, and the idea that Harry tried to prevent her from fighting, when she probably trusted him to understand her abilities and insecurities, is likely unsettling to her to an extent. Harry is a person who's lost many people that he loved, and wants to prevent that from happening again; when he sees a ton of people fighting that he knows/loves, it's probably a lot more unsettling to him in comparison to others. This probably causes some tension whenever the subject matter of fighting opens up; there's a misunderstanding between the two, and it's one of the big arguments they'd have post-war, and it's one of the big obstacles in their relationship that both of them need to sort out before they can progress. It's an issue that likely won't be brought up immediately after the war, but something (especially given all their free time) to talk/argue about during the rest of the summer.

4. On the Weasley Family's Knowledge

This is something I've pondered over for /so/ long, and I still don't have a definite answer. There is one thing that I am certain about, and that's that I don't want Fred to know about Harry and Ginny. The fact that he dies before he gets to know about the two is something, I think, that would cause a strain on both of them for some time. In my mind, Fred doesn't know, so George doesn't know either because if one of them knew about something like this, the other would have too. Charlie and Percy, obviously, wouldn't have a clue; Harry barely sees Charlie, and Percy...well, we know about that. I don't think Ginny would have told anyone about her and Harry throughout the 1997-1998 school year, but /someone/ had to have seen the way the two were acting in DH, so if I had to guess, Mrs. Weasley suspects something (from summer's start), and likely confided in Mr. Weasley, although I'm not sure if they'd pinpoint it on romance in particular. Bill might have suspected, because I'm fairly certain that Ginny would have said something about wanting to go to Shell Cottage around April 1998. As for whether or not Ginny confided in Tonks...that's an idea I'm open to, since they go through similar situations regarding Harry and Lupin. Or maybe, to play a little Devil's Advocate, most of the Weasleys sans Percy and Charlie suspect something to varying degrees, but none of them are exactly certain. It's an idea that I'm still processing in my head, and I haven't come to a definite conclusion yet.

5. A Genuine Inquiry

Would Ginny's Patronus change? I've usually seen her situation in DH to be pretty similar to Tonks's from HBP. Is this the case? If so, I wonder if her Patronus changed to a stag or a doe. If not, I wonder about the significant differences in their situations. Making Ginny's Patronus change might serve for an interesting shock at 1997-1998 Hogwarts year, especially if the DA practices Patronuses.

6. Teddy

An idea that I've played around with in my mind is Ginny's relation with Teddy. There have been various fanon throughout fanfiction that makes Ginny Teddy's Godmother. For a time, I thought this theory was pretty cool. But after some time, I thought the situation seemed too perfect. BUT, if Ginny isn't Teddy's Godmother, it would be an excellent show of loyalty + strength of character, friendships, and relationship to her good friends (Tonks and Lupin), Teddy, and her boyfriend (Harry), if she were to take it upon herself to take care of Teddy with a responsibility similar to Harry's.

I'll likely add to this list later on, but if you see this list and want to discuss it, I'd be more than willing to.

The Sleepless Halloween by Burnt Ash [Reviews - 5]
The night of Halloween often brings chaos, trouble, storms, and misery among the denizens of Wizarding Britain. This is no different for a certain Ginny Weasley and Neville Longbottom as they try to find solace in the night, but are faced with boggarts, love, and the pain of isolation in a sleepless Halloween. One-Shot, Ginny/Neville friendship with a decent amount of H/G in the background, and canon pairings. PG for language, but nothing over-the-top.